Today, 275 lawmakers are taking the oath of office in the unfinished Parliament building, where work has not been completed despite repeated extensions.
We use Google Cloud Translation Services. Google requires we provide the following disclaimer relating to use of this service:
This service may contain translations powered by Google. Google disclaims all warranties related to the translations, expressed or implied, including any warranties of accuracy, reliability, and any implied warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and noninfringement.
The construction of the new parliament building was supposed to be completed by 16 Asho 2079 as per the contract signed on 16 Asho 2076. But even though preparations are being made to extend the deadline for the sixth time, the construction work has not been completed.
The Ministry of Urban Development had awarded the contract for the new parliament building to hold the meeting of the House of Representatives to be elected in 2079, but the building could not be fully ready by the time the new parliament meeting was held after the 2082 elections.
Today, 275 lawmakers are taking oath in the incomplete parliament building, where the work was not completed despite repeated extensions. President Ram Chandra Poudel, the then Speaker Devraj Ghimire and many others visited the parliament building to monitor it. The chairpersons and members of the thematic parliamentary committees had also instructed to monitor the parliament building on-site and complete the work quickly. Every time the urban development minister was replaced, the first thing to do was to monitor the parliament building and instruct to complete the work quickly.
But neither did the construction businessmen move, nor was the work completed. The hall of the House of Representatives is not ready yet. As the hall is not ready, the National Assembly meeting is also being held in the old hall of the Agriculture Committee in the Singha Durbar complex.
Since the Parliament building is not ready, the existing 300-capacity multi-purpose hall is being prepared overnight to administer the oath to the elected MPs. There is no plan to immediately prepare the 12 buildings including the House of Representatives and the National Assembly. Even the Federal Parliament Secretariat has given up on this matter.
Joint Secretary and Spokesperson of the Federal Parliament Secretariat Ekram Giri said that the hall has been prepared to function as it should. ‘Only 275 people take the oath in this hall,’ he said. ‘There is no alternative to this at the moment, this is how the work of the Parliament will be done for some time.’ The Parliament session will begin within 30 days of the date of the final vote results being made public or only after the President calls it on the recommendation of the government.
‘The session has not been called yet,’ he said, ‘so it is not possible to say when the first meeting will be held.’ The hall has been prepared for the oath-taking.
Even though pressure has been being exerted since Dashain to complete the construction of the Parliament building quickly, the work has not been done accordingly, says Giri, Joint Secretary Spokesperson of the Parliament Secretariat.
Director General of the Urban Development and Building Construction Department, Rabindra Bohara, said that the handover of the building will be done soon after the construction work is completed. ‘We will prepare the Parliament building by the first week of Jestha and hand it over,’ he said, ‘The work of false ceiling is being done on the interior, painting and road blacktop work in the building premises are also being done.’
According to him, the main work of the building has been completed. He informed that while 60/65 people were working earlier, the pace of construction was slow, now 430 people are working.
The contract for the construction of the parliament building was taken by Tundi-Sec JV with a budget of only 5.67 billion rupees. After the work was not completed within the initial deadline, the deadline was extended for the first time until 30 Chaitra 2079, but the work was not completed .
The deadline was extended for the second time until 19 Asoj 2080, the third time until 19 Chaitra 2080, the fourth time until 18 Chaitra 2081 and the fifth time until 16 Poush 2082. After the work was not completed during that period too, preparations are being made to extend the deadline for a short period for the sixth time.
The parliament building has been constructed on an area of 156 ropanis in the Singha Durbar complex . The new building is up to five floors. The House of Representatives, the National Assembly Building, the 'Central Lobby', the office building for very distinguished persons, a library and a museum are being prepared there.
The parliamentary party office building, parliamentary committee building, parliament secretariat building, canteen, press and printing building have been built separately. Infrastructure is being prepared to park 476 four-wheelers and 800 two-wheelers.
A building to house security personnel has also been constructed. Chainlink Engineering Company has taken a separate contract for ‘roofing’ at a cost of Rs 37.9 million. According to the contract signed on 27 Falgun 2080, the work has not been completed even though the deadline was till mid-Magh.
KC-Shyamsundar-Baniya JV was responsible for ‘interior’. The contract amount for this is Rs 2.34 billion 5.4 billion. An agreement was signed on 17 Ashad 2080 to complete the work by Ashad 2081.
Later, the deadline was extended to 16 Chaitra 2081, but after the work was not completed, the deadline was extended again to 16 Poush 2082. But after the work was not completed, preparations are being made to extend the deadline. On 24 Bhadra, protesters vandalized and set fire to the International Conference Center in New Baneshwor, where the parliament was previously sitting.
